Hatchling
by saphira e.sparrow
Summary: Janto love. Takes place after Cyberwoman. there's fluff, feels, and a little steamy paragraph in this one. ;D


Hellllooo everybody! I got a new janto for you. Which you know that, that's why you checked here. So I'll shut up and get to the fic.

Myfanwy was Ianto's only real friend since he joined Torchwood Three, Cardiff.

Since he was the unofficial official butler for the team, he was in charge of taking care of the inmates and "mascot of the group" i.e. Weevils and whatever else came out of the Rift.

It also didn't hurt that the out of time extinct dino saw Ianto as her hatchling and whenever he'd showed up to make his rounds, she was wrapping a wing around him and cuddling into him, nuzzling and purring over his head.

She was his soundboard. Whenever it got too hard during the day, he'd come up to her nest. He never needed to sneak, people paid him little attention to begin with, so he came and went as he pleased, and would tell her his sorrows, his frustrations, and heartbreak. Oh, he had a lot of heartbreak. Even before his ex-cyber girlfriend was gunned down by the team.

The plan had been so easy. Seduce Captain Jack Harkness, which wouldn't require much effort, if the rumors and slander from Torchwood Tower were true, to distract him for when he went down to the basement and took care for Lisa. Easy enough, yes?

But like they say if it's too good to be true it probably is, and Ianto's plan was no exception.

He started to stop remembering he even had a girlfriend that desperately needed him, that was dying down in the basement. That had become a dirtier secret with each passing day then she should. And why was that? Because of Captain Jack Bloody Harkness.

It wasn't really Jack's fault; there was nothing he did that was out of the ordinary. It was just when he was with Jack it was like the whole world took a hike and left them alone for only each other to enjoy.

When Jack held him close, not just a set up to go have sex, but because he needed to have contact with something living that wasn't ended by a gun. Talked to him, mostly drunk, about how he felt so torn apart by the time period he was stuck in, waiting to be made right by the man that left him behind. Looked at him like there was nothing more beautiful and right with the crazy, ignorant world then the tea boy who looked so good in his suits and served soul saving coffee with kisses of encouragement for when UNIT called.

He started to fall for the captain, his boss. It was as easy as his plan was. Never had he felt safer or more cared for then with this immortal, impossible, courageous man of out time. Never was he so contented, so happy; then he'd go home and see the picture of Lisa on his nightstand and it all came crashing down around him again.

He'd rush back to check on her the guilt tearing at his insides the whole way. His loyalty and love for her were becoming blurred.

He couldn't even remember how they had their first kiss and that had been his first of first. Now when he thought of it he could only remember his first with Jack instead.

It was his third week in Three and a whole mess of space junk had poured out of the Rift. And all of it, everything single piece had to be archived. It cost him four days of sleep, and afterward he was ready to drop.

Jack had came and got him and took him home even went so far as to tuck him in like a child and ruffled his hair. The kiss had been an accident, Ianto had turned his head to thank him, at the same instinct Jack had leaned in to peck his cheek, their lips connected. He couldn't tell who it was that pulled the other back, not that it mattered. That night had been amazing and beautiful, they kissed each other till the dawn light peeked through the bedroom curtains and even then it didn't last long enough.

Ianto had never kissed another man, never even thought enough of men to give it a go. As a result he constantly felt embarrassed by not knowing how to go about it. But Jack was ever patient, understanding and encouraging. He wasn't that anymore.

Ianto understood that Jack felt like everything they ever did, every touch, every kiss, and intimate touch was a lie, a lie to protect his secret cyber girlfriend. Jack felt betrayed by him.

Ianto wished that was the only reason, that everything was a ruse till he got what he wanted, but no, the universe wasn't that kind to him. It would be so much better if that were so but it wasn't.

He felt horrible, dirty, and vile for making Jack think he was being played with when if anything he only wanted Jack. If he had met Jack before Lisa. If he had come to yell at Yvonne and run into him. There were times he wished Lisa had died in the battle then he'd feel even more disgusting then he already did, to even have those thoughts. It was why he yelled at Jack that night, that Jack was a monster of all monsters. In all the emotions and adrenaline he yelled out his own insecurities. That if it weren't for Jack he wouldn't have to choose between them.

But he did; he chose Jack.

He was going to do it, he was going to to shoot died the girl he once loved but then she talked to him, to make him feel something, to manipulate him. And what torn him up was the fact he, himself, couldn't remember that moment.

The tent was replaced with Jack's bunker with him purposely turning down the heat to make Ianto cuddle up close to him. In the morning the Rift went off with Owen screaming about what he almost got into before getting called in. He felt so bad that it had come to this, that he had been so weak to not see it sooner, that Lisa wasn't his girl anymore.

He didn't love her; he had kept at it out of guilt for betraying her with Jack, for the battle of endless bodies. He should have made his choice after that first kiss. He should have dealt with it quietly like they did everything else with bodies, but didn't.

No one would have ever known, now it was too late. In the moment where he would have finally done it he turned away from the pain and the choice was taken out of his hands.

Now no one would listen. If he thought they ignored him before oh how wrong he was. Owen spat all manner of venom at him. But he understood, he knew why the prickly doctor would hate him trying like hell to save a girl he loved. He was reminded of losing his girl, his Katie, and hated Ianto for bringing that up again.

Tosh was quieter than usual. She wanted to help up was too unsure as to how to go about it that she didn't nothing at all.

Gwen, though. Gwen was the worst. It was no secret, well; no secret to him that her schoolgirl crush on Jack had morphed into a raging carnal desire to have the man. This resulted in her shirts having a lower and lower cut and tighter pants. Now that Ianto had royally balls up, the shark smelled blood in the water. She welded herself to Jack's side to play her role of reminding him of what it was to be human. She didn't outright say it but it showed in her dark malice filled eyes that she wanted him gone.

Jack was many things when it came to sex. A flirt, a charmer, open to anything really when it came to sex but the line was draw when it came to breaking up committed couples. She was the little sister in his eyes.

What they did wasn't as committed as dating but not as crude as shagging. Which made him feel all the more worse for how the cyber incident had ended between him.

He never should have had these feelings or if he did they shouldn't have been for Jack but Lisa, his girlfriend. But it stopped being a task, stopped being only a means of distraction. He looked forward to the moments when Jack would brush the backs of theirs hands together, where he would sneak searing kisses or caress when the team wasn't looking.

Where they'd spend the night in his bunker. The long nights that followed the longer days. Warm lips molding together, tongues dancing a tango, rough strong hands stroking his sides, tracing his body like he wanted to burn the image forever in his mind, then do it all again an hour later. Was it any wonder he forgot Lisa, Jack fogged his brain in the best of ways. Lying on the bed being held close, an arm around his waist. Those same hands that had taken him and teased him mercilessly hours before now soothing him into a deep, contented sleep.

Everything they had, what they might have had, was over.

There was no possible way Jack would forgive and forget. He might but never to the point of having Ianto like he had before. In matter of hours, he had lost his girlfriend, his friends and worst, he lost Jack.

Ianto knew what would happen, what always happened when there was a traitor in Torchwood; Retcon or a bullet. If he were allowed to choose, he'd have the bullet. He would rather die sad, destroyed, and alone before he forgot Jack; how it felt to matter to someone. Truly matter. If he never remembered that he was dead anyway.

That's why he had taking comfort in the only one left in Torchwood that cared about him regardless. The only one before and after Lisa that was happy to see him, and not just because he gave her chocolate, but because she was a mama bird around him, always preening over him keeping him close. He could use some soft contact like that after all the mess he had created around himself.

Myfanwy let out her usual cheerful happy chirp when she saw her hatchling coming to greet her. "Hey girl," he smiled offering her a treat. A deep purring filled the nest, as she settled down taking Ianto with her, wrapped in her warm leathery wings. When she stroked her beak against his cheek he let go.

The tears came slowly at first then began to pour down his face as all his pain was brought to the surface. Myfanwy couldn't understand what had her precious hatchling so upset. Maybe that shiny thing she had tried to eat the other day had hurt him. She knew he was always a little sad but he was very strong for one of the smallest hatchling she had ever seen.

No matter what she tried, wrapping him up, purring soothing sounds, nuzzling his hair he wouldn't cheer up, just continue to cry his misery.

From his office Jack watched in sorrow as Jones, Ianto Jones, the most stubborn, strongest and most resilient person he knew have an emotional breakdown in the comfort of a prehistoric reptile. For all the pain of being betrayed the sight still tugged at his heart.

He was too young to feel this much pain, this much agony. He had been through the Battle of Canary Warf, pulled his girlfriend out of a converter and tried like hell to fix her, the world be damned. It hurt to know everything they had done was a lie.

_But what if it wasn't?_

On the screen it looked like too much misery to be had over just the loss of his girlfriend. He lived with the knowledge ever since the Tower fell that he might lose her, if not to the team then by the conversion itself. He had to have known at a level she might not ever come back. He had to accept the risks if he brought that doctor in. But this this added pain; it was something he didn't think he could have lost.

Was there hope? Was it too much to have hope? That is wasn't all a lie? Could Ianto really be so invested in their time together to forget his girlfriend in the basement?

So focused on the questions circling his head he didn't hear the sobs stop and a soft purring lullaby replacing it. What a sweet old girl.

Figuring he had both nothing else to loose and not getting anywhere with his thoughts he decided to ask the man himself.

Ianto looked so lost and tormented even in his sleep. He also looked so very young. Jack reached out to sooth his hair when Myfanwy growled at him and wrapped her wings around her hatchling tighter.

"Can I?" he asked. She eyed him for awhile then stretched her head out and with her beak, _thumped_ him on the head!

"Ow!" he cursed. An odd chucking sound came from the dino. She was laughing at him!

Jack didn't much like getting teased by a lizard with wings. But before he could start scolding, she unwrapped her wings and held Ianto out to him.

"Ianto, come wake up," he whispered, petting his face. "Nuh, warm," the man mumbled, blindly swiping at what was trying to wake him up. God he looked so cute.

"It's warm in the office too," he teased.

"Don't deserve it. You hate me," he replied back fully awake, but eyes still glazed with pain.

"No I don't," he denied and was surprised to find it was true. He really didn't hate the man. "You hurt and betrayed me pretty bad though."

"I didn't want to," he said, tears forming in his eyes again. "It was suppose to be a lie but you ruined it. You made me care and feel cared for, for the first time."

"If I can ask one more favor; I want the bullet as punishment. I don't want to forget anything. Not because I'd forget Lisa, hell I'd give up every one of those, but not you. I don't want to forget you. You are the first one who ever made me feel like I mattered, that would miss me if I was gone. I don't want to forget that," he confessed miserably.

"Oh Yan," he murmured, tucking the Welshman's head in the nape of his neck, and stroked his hair as he broke again. "Of course you matter. You matter a lot. I'm not going to kill you or make you forget I couldn't handle either. I'd miss you too much."

The watery shaky smile he got was all he needed. A shudder ran through the Welshman's frame.

"Come on, I wasn't kidding about the office being warmer." Giving him, not his usual megawatt smile, but a soft and genuine and just as glowing smile that was just for his Yan.

Ianto barely laid his foot on the ground of the Hub before Jack scooped him up in his arms and held him close to his chest, like a bride or lost child come home.

As warm and nice as it was Ianto still struggled to get out of it. "Jack what the hell are you doing?" he demanded. "Taking care of you in high fashion, Jones, Ianto Jones," he purred. And he let him.

That night jack would hover and fluff over his tired emotionally rung out Welshman. They'd cuddle close, their hands and lips relearning what was blurred and forgotten in the chaos. Ianto, in agreement for there to be no more lies, would tell Jack the worst of himself. Afterword, Jack would go quiet for a time, then he'd spin a tale of a place that was not yet founded called Boeshine Pennsylvania, and a boy who would grow to be the man he held now.

Jack wasn't his real name he learned, but it was the name that so perfectly described him. The strength, weakness, calm, anger, and compassion, the love. There was no greater way to describe the complex man then by just saying Jack. It was the name Ianto had called in everyway till now and by the sheerest of dumb luck would continue to call. There wasn't enough Retcon in the world to make Ianto forget the impossible, complex, beautiful man. Fortunately he'd never have to.

I feel like the ending was rushed if it comes across that way I'm sorry. I had the idea for a while then it just cut off, I tried to save it but this was the best it got.

Review, plz.


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